Dataset National Rehabilitation Reporting System (NRS)

The National Rehabilitation Reporting System (NRS) collects data from participating adult inpatient rehabilitation facilities and programs in 9 provinces across Canada. Facilities and programs that participate in the NRS include: specialized facilities, hospital rehabilitation units, hospital rehabilitation programs, and designated rehabilitation beds in other facilities.

Service providers in participating facilities collect data in several ways: at the time of admission to inpatient rehabilitation; at the time of discharge from inpatient rehabilitation; and through an optional process following discharge from inpatient rehabilitation. Facilities that participate in the NRS sign an end-user license agreement with CIHI. Facilities and programs that participate in the NRS may include:

Specialized facilities

Hospital rehabilitation units

Hospital rehabilitation programs

Designated rehabilitation beds

The minimum data set contains clinical data on functional status. This is based on the 18-item FIM® instrument and additional elements that measure cognitive function and the performance of instrumental activities of daily living (IADLs).

Facilities collect client data on admission and discharge from the inpatient rehabilitation program. They send the data directly to CIHI on a quarterly basis so it can be included in online comparative reports.

There is an option to collect additional information in a follow-up assessment 80 to 180 days after a client completes his or her rehabilitation stay. Collecting information at this stage provides an opportunity to assess whether functional outcomes gained during rehabilitation have been sustained.

Purpose:

To deliver comparable and actionable information to accelerate improvements in health care, health system performance and population health across the continuum of care

Type of Data (select all that apply):

Health Care and Health Services

Data Collection Method (select all that apply):

Individual Level Data, Administrative Data

Scope:

Canada-wide

Identifiers used for linkage:

Personal Health Number, Date of birth

Access requiredments and conditions for Researchers and Projects:

Data Access Conditions:

In addition to the CIHI data access condition below, requests for Quebec data are subject to review and authorization from the Quebec Privacy Commission (Commission d’accès à l’information du Québec) and the Québec Ministry of Health and Social Services (MSSS).

CIHI discloses health information and analyses on Canada’s health system and the health of Canadians in a manner consistent with its mandate and core functions. These disclosures typically fall into one of four categories:

Disclosures to parties with responsibility for the planning and management of the health care system to enable them to fulfill those functions;

Disclosures to parties with a decision-making role regarding health care system policy to facilitate their work;

Disclosures to parties with responsibility for population health research and/or analysis; and

Prior to disclosure, CIHI reviews the requests to ensure that the disclosures are consistent with the above and meet the requirements of applicable legislation.

CIHI data disclosures are made at the highest degree of anonymity possible while still meeting the research and/or analytical purposes. This means that, whenever possible, data are aggregated.

Where aggregate data are not sufficiently detailed for the research and/or analytical purposes, data that have been de-identified using various de-identification processes may be disclosed to the recipient on a case-by-case basis and where the recipient has entered into a data protection agreement or other legally binding instrument with CIHI.

Only those data elements necessary to meet the identified research or analytical purposes may be disclosed.

Requires the recipient to comply with any other provision that CIHI deems necessary to further safeguard the data.

Prior to the disclosure of de-identified data for research purposes, the requester will provide CIHI with evidence of Research Ethics Board approval.

CIHI reserves the right to impose any other requirement(s) as needed on a case-by-case basis in order to maintain the confidentiality of de-identified data.

Prior to disclosure, program areas will evaluate the de-identified data to assess and subsequently minimize privacy risks of re-identification and residual disclosure, and to implement the necessary mitigating measures to manage residual risks.

CIHI will not disclose de-identified data if it is reasonably foreseeable in the circumstances that it could be utilized, either alone or with other information, to identify an individual and that, where it is reasonably foreseeable that it could be used to identify an individual, the information will be treated as personal health information.

Within the NRS, a client is categorized into 1 of 17 health condition groups known as Rehabilitation Client Groups (RCGs). The RCG selected for a particular client is based on the condition that best describes the primary reason for his or her admission to the inpatient rehabilitation unit or facility, such as a stroke or limb amputation. For a full list of RCGs used in the NRS, send an email to nrs@cihi.ca.